Pre-Tridentine Confession

[JesuXPIPassio]

Hi, RomeReports on EWTN says that the first confessionals came after Trent. How was Confession done before that? Did we have something like the option today of a face-to-face Confession, or was it something like what we see in the East? Or was it something else entirely? Details on this seem to be rather scarce.

Thanks!

 

[rpp]

This is an excellent question. I will look to replies.

 

[markomalley]

Hi, RomeReports on EWTN says that the first confessionals came after Trent. How was Confession done before that? Did we have something like the option today of a face-to-face Confession, or was it something like what we see in the East? Or was it something else entirely? Details on this seem to be rather scarce.

Thanks!

I found this in the Grove Dictionary of Art:

Closet-like piece of furniture used in the Roman Catholic Church and some other liturgically ‘high’ denominations for auricular confession. Confessionals are always made out of wood, since it was thought inappropriate to use more costly materials for non-liturgical church furnishings. Several types of confessional were in existence during the Middle Ages. In the 12th century the priest was seated while the penitent knelt in front of him. From the 14th century in Sweden, where men lived alongside women in double monasteries, grilles were inserted in special recesses in the choir walls to prevent the priest from coming into contact with the sisters. The first confessional rooms, with a grille opening into the church, appeared in Portugal in the early 15th century (e.g. at Guarda Cathedral); a century later (1517–20), at S Maria, Belém, in Lisbon, the confessional room was extended to a double alcove, one for the priest and another for the penitent, connected by a grille. In the 16th century in northern Europe confessional grilles were inserted in the choir aisle windows so that confession could be made from outside the church. During the Reformation, after a number of disputes over the objectivity of confession, regulations for the sacrament were drawn up at the Council of Milan (1565): confession was only to take place inside the church between dawn and sunset; the box was to be clearly visible and to stand outside the choir; and it was to have a partition with a grille through which the priest could communicate with the penitent. St Carlo Borromeo also recommended that the priest’s seat should be closed off on two sides, with a roof above. The addition of a third enclosure behind the penitent was proposed at the Council of Mechelen (1607). The earliest confessionals of the Counter-Reformation consist of two parts and are closed off at the sides with a roof over the top. This, the alcove type, first gained popularity in Italy. Later a three-piece confessional of this form appeared in the southern Netherlands and south Germany. During the 17th century two further types consisting of three sections came into use: the cell type, which is similar to the alcove type but has no roof (e.g. the Klosterkirche, Stromberg, Germany), and the alcove-cell type, which has a roof over the priest’s alcove but open cells for the penitents (e.g. Onze-Lieve-Vrouw, Aarschot, Belgium; 1647).
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[Timothysis]

I always remember in the movie The Seventh Seal the knight making his confession at the grill in the wall. Unfortunately, it was Death who heard his confession!!!